Tough year for ethics, Facebook

Perhaps, as you have been celebrating the holidays and living your life, you missed some noteworthy news developments. As a public service, here they are:

There is a Republican National Committee in name only. In the interest of being re-elected, Donald Trump has merged it with his very flush campaign apparatus. You knew Trump had co-opted the party; now it’s official. They’ll be in the same offices, raising money and working for the same cause: four more years as president for the man with the big brain.

There is no more Trump Foundation. The state of New York shut it down, insisting it had no oversight, did not give money to legitimate charities and was no more than a checkbook designed to collect other people’s money for Trump’s personal, political and business interests. We do not know who will take up the slack and pay the $7 annual Boy Scouts dues for one Scout, such as Trump’s then-11-year-old son. We do not know who will buy $20,000 and $10,000 portraits of Trump to hang over sports bars in billionaires’ mansions.

Despite Trump’s insistence that he eliminated ISIS from Syria, he did not. He may redistribute U.S. forces around the globe, putting troops on our borders to string barbed wire to keep out fleeing women and children, but ISIS, like the Taliban, is far from being defeated.

There is no such thing as privacy. You may not be able to figure out how Facebook works, but be confident that somebody you did not want to see all your personal comments and photos has seen and shared them. Millions of photos and comments that users decided not to post or deleted have also been shared. This has started an exodus off Facebook, which may cause a re-emergence of once-ridiculed family Christmas letters.

Republicans and Democrats in Congress actually cooperated with each other and the White House to pass a criminal justice reform bill. The U.S. has imprisoned more of its citizens than any other country; the bill just passed by the Senate (similar to one passed by the House) gives judges more discretion in sentencing, requires prisoners be jailed within 500 miles of home and provides more money for vocational training and education for inmates.

Supreme Court justices do not have to abide by ethics rules with which lesser judges must comply. So said a judicial panel looking into and dismissing 83 charges of misconduct filed against new Justice Brett Kavanaugh. It turns out the high court does not have a code of conduct, and Congress has never written one for it.

The world is becoming a much less safe place for journalists, which may not surprise you given the verbal onslaughts against them by certain leaders of democracies, which invented the free press. Sixty-three journalists, and 14 people who helped produce news, were killed from Jan 1 to Dec. 1. An additional 348 were imprisoned.

Remember when ketchup and pickle relish were declared vegetables? Now comes the Trump administration to roll back 2010 regulations limiting saturated fats and refined sugars and increasing fruits and vegetables for school lunches for 30 million children. Great. You ban high-fat chocolate milk at home, and your child gets it at school. (Note: The administration argues children won’t eat healthful food; two studies say that’s not true. Note two: Twenty percent of American children are obese, and the U.S. adult obesity rate is one of the world’s highest.)

Cellphone and utility payments will now be reflected in some credit scores, making it likely more consumers will be approved for loans.